These 15 Case Studies of Accessible Tourism Destinations were commissioned in 2013 by the European Commission as part of the research tender awarded to EWORX S.A., ENAT and VVA, examining the supply side of accessible tourism in Europe.
People with disabilities and older people are considered as an important and growing number of clients for all kind of events and meetings (about 20 % of the population today). Accommodating and supporting their needs and providing accessible services is becoming more and more a success criterion for conferences and events.
The Declaration which resulted from the 1st UNWTO Conference on Accessible Tourism in Europe, held on 19-20 November 2014 in the Republic of San Marino, can be read and downloaded here in English, French and Spanish.
French Masters student in Disability Research, Eloïse Auffret-Novice, has taken up a 4-month ERASMUS+ traineeship at the ENAT Secretariat in Athens. She will make a study of accessibility and access information for visitors at five of the most notable museums in Greece. Here she introduces the theme of her chosen subject.
On 5 December 2014, 27 speakers from local regional authorities and others met at the EESC to discuss ways of improving inclusive social, political and physical infrastructures while promoting accessibility for all within the tourism industry.
Although historical heritage buildings undoubtedly are an important part of many touristic routes, provision of accessibility to them often is a technically complex process. This is a real challenge - the desire to preserve the visual appearance of historic buildings and hence their value, but at the same time making them accessible to everyone. This European Lifelong Learning "Grundtvig" adult learning project addressed these issues.
This project is a continuation of the project "Accommodation and Catering Accessibility for Disability”(ACAD), finished at the end of 2011, which met with a great interest of disabled people, institutions dealing with equality issues and the hotel and catering sector. In the TEAD project the results of its predecessor will be transferred to other services in tourism sector including tourist information centres, travel agencies, tourist guide organisations, tourist transport, regional promotion offices etc. The results are enriched with examples of good practices and experience of a new partner in the project – Access Sweden.
Being aware of the market potential of people with accessibility needs due to social- demographic trends internationally, the Basque Country is working in order to create a "Tourism for All in Basque Country" tourism offer. Based on an already created accessibility model, this project's objective is to further develop the model including required standards for new services and packages within six itineraries in the Basque Country taking into account the whole value chain and also the quality of the services provided.
Project STRING is a transnational cooperation initiative to be implemented by 12 partners from 6 countries. It aims to create 9 fully accessible itineraries respectively in Italy (Piedmont Regione), Spain (Ávila) and Bulgaria (Sozopol) which will then be developed into comprehensive tourist packages. Such packages will be put on the market, by Tour Operators through Travel Agency, singular or in composable modular box that allow customers to make their preferred combination.
ACCESSTOUR is an acronym expressing accessible tourism in a short way. Accessible tourism could be considered disadvantaged in comparison with more traditional mass tourism. In the last years accessible tourism has become synonym of high quality care for persons with special needs and accessible destinations. The project aims at marking out the special qualities of accessibility implemented with effective and user friendly services.
The project "Cosy for You", supported by a web site and a mobile application (C4Y mobile app.) consists in the dissemination of "knowledge" of places, travel goods and services accessible at 360° in the Campania Region, in the South of Italy, starting with five different destinations: Napoli, Pozzuoli and "Campi Flegrei", Sorrento and the Sorrentine peninsula, Vesuvius area and Benevento, including 14 itineraries. It is proposed as best practice to other public and private institutions active in tourism in Italy and worldwide.
The overall objective of the project is the implementation, promotion and marketing of universal accessibility to the Route “VIA REGIA – Cultural Route of the Council of Europe” between Frankfurt/Main and Leipzig combining 8 destinations.
